Spending your limited time on the things that really matter creates a more intentional and solid yes, builds trust and coherence.

If you believe that you must keep your promises, overdeliver and treat every commitment as though it’s an opportunity for a transformation, then the only way you can do this is to turn down most opportunities.

No I can’t meet with you, no I can’t sell it to you at this price, no I can’t do this job justice, no I can’t come to your party, no I can’t help you. I’m sorry, but no, I can’t. Not if I want to do the very things that people value my work for.

Yes is the future no—in other words, you are lying, often to your dear ones.

Say yes too often, and your body will automatically tell you no in no time.

No is the foundation that we can build our yes on.

Here are nine practices to say a strategic no in order to create space in your life for a more intentional yes.

Know your no. Identify what’s important to you and acknowledge what’s not.

Be appreciative.

Say no to the request, not the person.

Explain why.

Be as resolute as they are pushy.

Practice.

Establish a pre-emptive no.

Be prepared to miss out.

Gather your courage.

Say no to all issues that do not align with values, goals and norms—that fall outside the tolerance of your self or your organization.

About 30 people in a lean startup context, with about one third coming from various internal departments and two thirds from external parties, assembled to completely overhaul the digital experience—website and apps—from a major Dutch company.

Only recently the group is complete, storming towards their goal. Each individual brings her or his own view on agile and lean, resulting in a potpourri of practices, each trying to find the best way to get going.

To streamline all these efforts and embed organizational and practical feedback loops, the group conducts a series of values-based Agendashift experiments. A six week cadence of Agendashift surveys provides the input for regular ‘retroprospection’. The first survey has just been completed.

Based on the survey’s results, a single lean style ‘A3 Mirror’ distills the essence of the first survey. Next survey is in a couple of weeks, and allows the team at large to check their progress in specific areas.

The results of the survey fall into two categories:

Tops

key areas that the team sees as their strengths;

a simple copy the survey’s prompt.

Tips

key areas that can improve the team’s way of working;

phrased as “instructions” in order to turn observations into action-oriented language—just like in the patterns of a Pattern Language; and

the source for three key objectives to bring focus on what matters most, and candidates to be turned into a limited set of Objective & Key Results.

Somehow, I always have disliked radar charts. They connect unassociated dots and I find them antique remnants from the past millennium. They yearn for a fresh new look. Pondering and visualizing, I came up with the ‘”’flower chart”’’. The unfolding of the flower shows its gradual development, adds the time laps or ‘Zeitgeist’ to it.

The examples below use the six values of [http://positiveincline.com Mike Burrows]’ [https://www.agendashift.com Agendashift], ”’value-based delivery, change, and leadership”’, based on Agile, Lean, and Kanban.

General Stanley McCrystal from the U.S. Joint Special Operations Task Force in [https://hbr.org/2015/08/what-companies-can-learn-from-military-teams HBR » What Companies Can Learn from Military Teams]:

I still believe in rehearsals, but I’ve learned they have a different value. When I joined the Army Rangers in 1985 we’d rehearse airfield seizure operations—we’d parachute in wearing night vision goggles, and take the field. It’s a pretty complex thing, and we’d do it over and over. We’d have contingencies in case things went wrong, but we were always trying to make things as foolproof as we could.

The longer we did it, the more I realized the value of rehearsal was not in trying to get this perfectly choreographed kabuki that would unfold as planned.

The value of rehearsal was to familiarize everybody with all the things that could happen, what the relationships are, and how you communicate. What you’re really doing is ”’building up the flexibility to adapt”’.

The one who learns the most is the teacher, not the students. Teaching, in contrast to being taught, is a wonderful way to learn.

Schools have reversed the proper role of students and teachers—the roles that were played in the old one-room school house. The students taught each other with assistance from the teacher as they, the students, requested.

According to The Association of Libraries in the United States, retention rates for each type of exposure are as follows:
*10% of what is seen
*20% of what is heard
*30% of what is seen and heard
*70% of what is talked over with others
*80% of what is used and done in real life
*95% of what someone else is taught to do

So,

Tell them, and they will forget.
Show them, and they will remember.
Involve them, and they will understand.